


Until The Stars Tremble

by Mechanic_Dove



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Bullshit Science, Captivity, Drowning, Hunk is incredibly sweet, I just like Lance suffering for some reason, Lance's family is great, M/M, Sirens, confusing story telling, language barriers, morality issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-29
Updated: 2016-08-29
Packaged: 2018-08-11 18:36:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7903357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mechanic_Dove/pseuds/Mechanic_Dove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He broke the surface, screaming and wriggling in the hell of net and helplessness. Screaming turned into singing, desperate, scared melodies ripping from his throat. He knew they were weak, he knew he was dead, he knew, he knew, he knew</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It was in the late afternoon sun, water along the surface too warm with summer that Lance came upon the realization that perhaps there was a real problem to the west. For the most part, the politics of hunters was simple and straightforward. “We stay out of your way, your stay out of ours and we all get our own kills.” This continued to be true. Lance was a hunter and nothing more, but there were too many hulls overhead. Too many lights skimming along the water, too many blaring noises, drowning out the sweetest of his sisters’ voices to ignore as the moons waxed and waned with the tide.  
As a strict rule, no one took more than what they needed to survive. There were too many variables, too many problems with over hunting that even the hatchlings were aware that they were only to take what would fill their bellies and nothing more.

~

Lance couldn’t help but think he’d been in better situations in his life. Even so, he felt like he was suffocating, thrashing against rope and the hopelessness he knew accompanied the situation he was undoubtedly going to die in, lest his bad luck finally start paying him back in full with its counterpart.  
He broke the surface, screaming and wriggling in the hell of net and helplessness. Screaming turned into singing, desperate, scared melodies ripping from his throat. He knew they were weak, he knew he was dead, he knew, he knew, he knew  
~

Even as hunters, his family had been distinctly low on prey. His mother insisted that they hunt only when they were starving, and to catch fish whenever they could, no matter how hard that was. Fish were always faster, and they never listened to song or paused at the beautiful human faces Lance and his sisters had to offer. His father told him that this is what set them apart from the hunters to the south and the hunters to the west. 

They knew the value of moderation. To the south, his father had told him that they rarely hunted at all. That more often than not they would happily starve for their ideals of equality and what was and wasn’t moral. To the west, they worked almost the exact opposite. His father would shake his head and tell him how the water always ran red in the west, how prey rarely went there anymore. Only the foolish and the uninformed went to the land of hunters for any reason, and they most certainly died for it.

His mother had shushed him, upset. She’d told him they were just terrible rumors. That no one would hunt until the waters were red. 

Lance never really knew what to believe  
~

He was deposited onto a too dry, too hot deck, and the voices around him were non-stop though he couldn’t actually understand a single one. Over and over he slammed his tail down, trying both to free himself from the net, and ward off anyone who came close. His song never stopped spilling from his lips, but he knew, he knew 

A bucket full of salt water was dumped over him, leaving him gasping and arching, desperate for more. No relief came, his eyes stung when he opened them from the intensity of the light, his scales itched, the voices were too loud, too constant, he couldn’t tell if they sounded angry or happy, or urgent

He kept singing  
~

“You’re doing it wrong. Listen, do what I do.”

“I am but it’s not working. It’s never worked, what makes you think it’ll start now?”

“You’re almost of age, you’ll die if you don’t make it work.”

“Wow. Nice pep talk, I’m now ready to take on my future with the knowledge that I’ll die a defect. Thanks Nadia.”

“Oh shut up, I’m trying to help you.”

“Are you? I was having a hard time separating ‘helping’ from ‘yelling at’”

“Lance.”

“I know. I know. But I can’t do it. I’ll just have to find another way. There has to be another way.”  
~  
When he woke up, he was back in water. Cramped up against glass, and in an area that was far too sunny, but in water none the less. In front of him, were a pair of eyes, black as the night and near vengeful. He wanted to sing, to urge this prey to drag whatever container they’d put him in to the water and release him, but he couldn’t make the noise come out.

The prey spoke to him, voice hard and angry. It was muffled through the layer of glass and water. Not that it really mattered, Lance couldn’t understand it anyway. 

The prey, after a few moments, seemed to understand this, its face scrunched up with frustration. It went to a bag towards the edge of the room they’d kept his cage in and pulled out a tiny rectangle. It walked back, eyes locked on the strange objects glow and pushed it up against the glass, having conjured an image of the prey itself with more prey, another similar creature by the looks of it. The new prey was taller, with black and white hair and had a hand in this smaller prey’s hair, ruffling it and smiling

The prey continued speaking, as if this picture should clarify the fact that its language was more or less complete gibberish. 

The frustration was soon mutual  
~  
While Lance had never personally had ‘the talk’ regarding prey, and why he should never hunt alone, he had listened to it many times. Always when one of his sisters decided they wanted to test what they could do on their own. There were strict rules in family, and stricter rules in hunting. Prey will only be prey so long as your song continues. When your singing stops, if your prey is not drowning, then the tables will turn. 

His father was adamant about it, having once lost a brother to prey that ripped him out of the water when the singing stopped. Prey was smart, and unless they were subdued, they would always win.  
Hunt in groups, sing until you’ve won, let your voice haunt the hunting grounds until the even the stars trembled.

Lance had never been formally given ‘the talk’

And he supposed it probably wouldn’t have done him much good anyway.  
~

They changed his water after the moon had begun to wane, careful to avoid his claws and teeth, but having the gall to laugh when he sung, fearful and desperate.

All but one. 

The frustrating prey was nowhere to be seen, and in the time that passed in the glass cage, the frustrating prey was just about all he got to see. 

The one that didn’t laugh was much bigger than the others, it kept his hands behind his back, shushing him softly and sounding sorry when it spoke to him. Lance gave up fighting, allowing the big warm hands of this prey to keep him still while his tiny sea was taken away.

Water was splashed against his gills regularly, and while breathing wasn’t easy, it was evident they weren’t trying to suffocate him

The kind prey sat with him until his cage was returned, and even then it scooped him up and placed him back in the fresh water as carefully as it could

It smiled and he found himself smiling back  
~

“Lance what happened” His father had been more worried than upset, but He felt scolded none the less

“I don’t know… I sung, I sang the song just like you taught me, but they didn’t seem… calmed by it.”

His mother tutted, pressing some cloth from her meal against where they prey had left its mark on his cheek

“Not everyone is a hunter. It’s nothing to be ashamed of”  
~

The large prey came back more and more after the first incident. It no longer brought promises of being torn out of the water and held still for a small eternity, but of something like companionship. Sometimes it would sit by his cage and speak, holding a rectangle full of thin, marked up rectangles. The large prey would read the markings for hours on end, looking back at Lance every now and then to make sure he hadn’t dozed off during some passage.

At the end of the first occasion like this, the prey had pointed to himself 

“Hunk” It said, very slowly, then again, “My name is Hunk”

Lance pulled himself up to the top and poked his head out of the water, “Hunk.”

Hunk smiled wider and nodded. He pointed to himself, “Hunk” then pointed at Lance

He frowned and tilted his head, singing the notes for his name

“…Lance?”

Lance shook his head and sung them again

Hunk tried to imitate them, and ended up red and embarrassed before repeating, “Lance”

He supposed that was close enough  
~

He was very young when he brought down his first kill. It was a fluke, he knew. The prey was so distracted with his sisters’ voice that it was easy to drag it under, to let the bubbles from its lungs brush past him while it struggled. To bite and tear at it until the water around him was red. 

He felt… Something. Something off. That he shouldn’t have the right to murder a creature with a face so like his own, but when his family came around, praising him and dragging the lifeless prey to the bottom he soon forgot  
~  
Thoughts like this kept him awake long into the nights on the ship. He tended to sleep more during the day, given. The sunlight through the window near his cage was unforgiving and he had to huddle in the far corner away from it to stay in the shadows of the room. He felt as close to at ease as he could when the moon shone down at him, and that was when the feelings always hit him

It’d been too long. His family must have assumed him dead by now and nothing he could do would fix it. He was alone and scared in a place he saw no chance of escaping and long into the deep dark nights he would sing for them. Hoping they would hear and come save him, crying for them in his hopelessness. He sang and sang until his song haunted the room he was stuck in, until the stars trembled.  
~

Hunk came with friends in the future, or more accurately, friend. A tiny thing, smaller than most prey Lance had ever seen, it came over to Lance and inspected him, two circles of glass sitting over its eyes and long hair braided over its shoulder.

It would turn and talk to Hunk, before sitting close and pulling another strange rectangle out of its bag, tip taping something away on it while Hunk smiled a Lance

He pointed at the prey, “Pidge.” 

Lance repeated the name coming to understand that like Sirens, all prey had their own individual names. Hunk had introduced him to others in the time Lance had been in the cage, bringing back the frustrated one and introducing him as “Keith” To which, out of some petty spite to the prey, Lance had refused to say anything. Hunk went on to show him the picture and introduce the prey with Keith in the picture as “Shiro”

Every time Pidge came with Hunk the prey would rarely talk, but she always seemed rapt and interested when Lance sung, to a point where he would make a point to sing for her, delighted that maybe his song was doing something, that she would come over, dull eyed and smiling to do anything to help him.

No such thing ever happened, but he could always hope.  
~

It took three moon cycles for him to realize that he was defective.

He had only just started hunting and he was defective. His song did nothing, no prey came to him, no prey fell into his trap and he was certain it was because they could see. Without the mask of magic to hide him, he was bare, all prey would be able to see his webbed fingers, too long teeth, ear fins that set him apart from them. The song was supposed to fix that and he could never sing it right

Or could never sing it at all.  
~

Days and months passed and Pidge came to visit more and more, coming even when Hunk didn’t. She urged him to sing, tip tapping away as he did so. He would be offended if not for the fact that she was one of the only friendly faces he’d seen since the net. 

Finally, after much waiting she presented it to him. It was a square of some sort, with a half sphere sticking out of either side, she leaned close to it

“Lance? Can you understand me?”

Lance moved back, eyes wide, looking from the device to pidge, who seemed more worried than proud and back again.

“I… Yes? What… what is this?”

Pidge grinned, eyes alight behind her glasses, “It’s a translator, I’ve been working on it. I thought it would be quicker than teaching you how to speak English”

“Ah… English?”

“Oh right, I guess some things don’t translate, huh? It’s our language, human language.”

He frowned at her, “You call yourselves Human?”

She nodded, expression quickly going from delighted to determined, “Lance, We have questions for you.”


	2. Chapter 2

By the time he’d received word, it was far too late. It had been a couple days with no hide nor hair of Shiro but that was more than expected. He went out fairly far when he tried to get in contact with Allura and tended to stay out too long when he did succeed. Long past when his rations would run out and he’d leave Keith on the shore worrying about him every minute he was gone.

He had to learn from Matt when the time actually came, when he arrived in their beaten up boat three days too late. He was powerless to do a damn thing to help him because he couldn’t stand to watch Shiro so close to the beast Allura. Couldn’t just stand in the background while her tail would flick out of the water, too sharp teeth bared at him in a smile that shouldn’t have been charming

He should have gone, suffered the heartbreak to make sure Shiro got home safe

He should have  
~

It had been a little over three months with the wretched creature on board and it had finally begun speaking directly to Keith. All it had done was insult him through the translator and stick its tongue out at him, which frankly was infuriating only in the sense that it was so childish. It was so beneath him to care what a monster through of him, and yet he was so angry.

It seemed more interested in Hunk and Pidge, trading answers with them to a number of questions. 

“I live in the east. We haven’t eaten anything along the lines of…” It paused, looking down at the tank and Keith took some satisfaction knowing that it was scared, “We’ve only eaten fish in the last moons, we rarely hunt humans unless there are many of them around, or hatchlings have just emerged.”

“So” Pidge looked mostly uncomfortable in the current situation, she’d unbraided and re-braided her hair at least three times since putting the Translator in front of the siren, “What you’re saying is, you have no idea where anyone would have disappeared”

“Oh no, I didn’t say that”  
~

Shiro had been something of a mentor, an upperclassmen that Keith had looked up to long before the two of them had ever actually spoken.

Shiro was bright, positive and fiercely loyal. More than once he’d lied for Keith and more than that he’d done everything in his power to keep them both out of any kind of trouble. He seemed to attract misfits,   
which Keith could only guess was how he ended up with both Holt siblings and Hunk.

He brought Keith into the fold, later than the rest and the group became something like infamous. They’d stayed together seemingly on pure coincidence through college. Though anyone with half a brain could see that Shiro’s strays followed him. The group was close, perfect for someone like Keith and it had been everything he’d ever wanted

Before Allura, anyway  
~

“Spit it out, we can’t waste any more time!”

The creature turned to him, bearing its teeth and for a moment Keith considered the morality of punching something that couldn’t run away

“Can he leave? I’m not telling you anything if he’s going to be breathing down my neck with his dumb mullet”

Pidge snorted half a laugh, muttering something to herself about the siren translation for “Mullet”

“I’m not going anywhere, tell me where he is.”

It glared at him, eyes too blue to be anything less than a creature of temptation, “Let me go. Let me back in the water and I’ll tell you.” It crossed its arms and put them on the edge of the case, leaning on them in a way that would seem casual if not for how tense it remained

“Like hell.”

It snorted, “Then I won’t tell you anything.”

It was only by Hunk seeing what Keith was about to do that the punch didn’t land. And it was three hours later before Pidge declared that the creature ‘Lance’ was unwilling to help them because of his actions.  
~

Shiro’s father had been something of a fisherman, owning a boat large enough to live on for days and more often than not dragging Shiro away on adventures when he should have been in school

It was only after Keith had just graduated that he was invited on one such adventure, finding the actual lull of fishing to be more annoying than relaxing. Shiro’d talked to him through it, making it mostly worth it, and Mr. Shirogane had even gone so far as to give Keith a beer. 

When the sun started setting, and Keith was anxious to turn around and go home, Mr. Shirogane had pulled in a net with far too many fish. Much, much more than Keith had ever seen them return with and Shiro turned to him, serious and grim

“You can’t tell anyone what we’re going to do, okay?”  
~

“Just apologize. You said it yourself, we don’t have time”

“There’s no way that thing is ever gonna tell us anything. It’s a siren Pidge, they only care about themselves and their own survival. It probably doesn’t even really know where we should be searching.”

“And if it does? What are you going to do if Shiro dies because you refused to play nice with our only lead?”

Keith grit his teeth, and went  
~

“Is that some kind of joke? You can trust me, whatever it is, I won’t tell anyone.”

Shiro gave him a little smile, he was restless. Since the afternoon started shifting to evening Shiro got nervous, always moving, always talking. 

Keith was half under the impression they were going to drop a body over board, or cut open one of the fish to show that it was full of diamonds or something similar when the lights started

Deep within the water, lines of lights moved back and forth, gliding smoothly around the boat. There were too many to count, in too many different places. Waiting for something. 

“Shiro?”

Her voice was like the ting of a bell, high and sweet. 

All of the tension that had been building up for hours in Shiro’s shoulders released, “Allura. You made it”

She laughed, her teeth far too long, and too sharp when she smiled, entirely against the soft roundness of her face, “I wouldn’t pass up the chance to see you.”

“We brought the fish for you, is your father coming?”

“No, he has matters to attend to with the west. He sends his gratitude” Her eyes glowed pink like the lights down her arms, white hair plastered to her shoulders. 

Mr. Shirogane spoke to her about her father, to send him his regards, for good luck with the upcoming weeks, for this and that, and it all felt far too human for Keith’s taste.

The look in Shiro’s eyes while she was there was far too human. Far too vulnerable, too eager to please.

She was kind, she treated him with nothing but respect and dignity and while they were leaving, lights in the water twinkling out of sight Shiro explained the whole thing

Pacifist monsters.

What a ridiculous notion  
~

The glass cage was small. Too small, as it had never actually been meant to hold a Siren. Keith began his peace offering by dumping a small, if not very alive fish in the case. The creature startled awake, spilling water onto the floor in its haste to understand what exactly was going on

“Something to eat.” He offered, taking way too much joy in seeing the siren turn and bend trying to get its hands around the little thing

He watched it devour the fish with a wet crunch and bits of blood soaking through its lips.

“We’ve gotten off on the wrong foot.”

It looked up at him, frowning and turned its attention back to its hands, washing the blood off in the water before going to clean its face, “I suppose we have.”

“Look. I’m sorry. My friend is either dead or in danger and I need to know where to find him. Anything you can give us might help.” He took a bit of a breath, “I’m begging you to help me”

It regarded him, “…Keith. I need to know you’ll set me free if I help you”

He didn’t know it knew his name, “I promise.”

It nodded and pulled itself upright, seemingly pleased with its standing and smiled at him. Like Allura its teeth were too big and too sharp for its mouth, eyes glowing faintly blue. But unlike her it didn’t appear 

charming or lovely. It was temperamental, it was either too trusting or never trusting enough, it smiled and sang at anyone who walked in, thought they were all pretty for some reason or another. Unlike Allura, 

Keith could count the flaws of this thing.

It was a comfort more than anything  
~

Shiro made him promise not to tell anyone, however over the course of the next couple weeks Keith watched as one by one his friends disappeared with Shiro and his father on one of their trips. Within weeks they all knew, within weeks Keith’s illusion of being special, of being the single one Shiro wanted to share his secret with was gone. 

Within weeks the group spoke openly of Allura

And within weeks everyone knew just how Shiro felt about her.  
~

Lance insisted that before he tell Keith anything that everyone had to be present, he’d said it was a long story, he wasn’t willing to tell it more than once but if they could they should set the ships course for “west”, which was the only form of direction Keith supposed they would get.

It hadn’t taken long to get Pidge and Hunk, but Matt and the few others they had aboard were too busy to be able to meet with the siren. 

Lance flicked his tail at them when they all arrived, tension held in his shoulders like Keith would see Shiro get when he was nervous. He wrung his hands, webbing bending strangely as he did so.  
He waited for his audience to be seated, and began his tale.


	3. Chapter 3

Lance knew of Allura. He’d seen her on more than one occasion, though they were mostly border skirmishes between the south and the west that the east got pulled into. She was stunning, even by Siren standards though even more so she was brilliant and quick witted. He tried to get her attention more than once when the east and the south really started interacting, but it always seemed to bite him in the tail. He’d once gotten stuck in between the planks of an old sunken ship after trying to convince her he was agile enough to get through them and with every attempt at her affection he was granted only the grace of her rejection.

At some point through the years, his advances lost their seriousness and became more like a joke between them. They became friends in the few and far in between instances that they got to see one another. He never knew she fraternized with prey, took their charity much less.

He wasn’t sure what to feel about that.

Siren hunting grounds were hard to come across. The water was always polluted, the prey scarce, the temperature far too cold for them… so when groups of Sirens came across a good land they would all settle, regardless of past rivalries or attempted murder plots.

The south and the west had apparently been fighting long before they arrived to the hunting grounds Lance’s family had lived on for generations. The west called themselves Galra, and their lights were almost always purple. Sharks even avoided that area, on instinct or because of instances of the past, Lance didn’t know.   
What he did know was that even if the water didn’t run red like his father had always told him, it still made his gills ache. He could never properly breathe around any Galra, and luckily the Galra rarely bothered with him or his family.

Allura had warned Lance about them being colonists. She’d warned him to be ready if they ever attacked. 

She warned him that they would.

Prey came from all around to see the sights around their hunting grounds, and if some people went missing without a trace in the area? It only seemed to attract more to their deaths. 

Lance’s family never took too much of the prey, one here or there, anytime a few of them came around alone on a little boat. He knew, however, that the Galra sometimes went as far as sinking entire ships to eat, and as far as Lance could tell the absence of the prey was noticed. Ships with lights would scan the water and he remembered being very young, very curious and swimming up to see what the lights were only to have his mother nearly tackle him, arms tight swimming deep deep down until the pressure hurt even Siren’s bones. 

“If you can’t lure prey in, never go to it.”

His sisters snickered until his mother turned her anger on them. They always teased him about it when their mother wasn’t listening. Until they got much older, they always took joy in his useless song. 

They enjoyed it until they realized he wouldn’t survive long as he was

Lance noticed then, the joke was no longer funny.

~

Lance wasn’t sure what possessed him to say that to a room full of prey, he was tired, he was sad, he missed the ocean and all he wanted in the world was his family.

He knew once he was out of the water he became vulnerable, and he’d made the mistake of referring to ‘humans’ as ‘prey’ to their faces. Pidge and Hunk didn’t appear to care, but Keith looked furious.

He cleared his throat, “I’m getting off topic.”

~

Like those to the south, Lance’s family had met the Galra. Lance had been told not to sing, for if any Galra knew the truth about his voice there was no telling what they would do. The meeting was conducted entirely by his mother, with only he and his eldest sister Nadia coming along as to show that they were not interested in war but in words. 

That was when Lance learned the true horrors of the west.

To impress Lance’s mother, they were led by four Galrans close to the surface, to an upward slope of rocks that rose out of the water. They were lead into a small passage, swimming further and further up until they hit the air. Going from gills to lungs was never a particularly comfortable experience, but the air of the cavern as not fresh and crisp like that of the open sea. He gagged and was dragged back under by Nadia before any Galran could hear him and consider it an insult.

The air of the cavern was thick with the stench of blood and infection. Along with something else Lance had never had the displeasure of encountering before. It was pitch dark, and even his eyes could only make out silhouettes of prey sitting on the rocks, as far from the water as they could manage. 

There were dozens of them, and Lance swore he heard soft sobbing from somewhere far back in the room. His mother’s lights flickered like they did when Lance’s sisters made fun of his song.

For the first time, he was really truly scared of the west.

A large Galran grinned at them, purple lights on his face illuminating the horrible edges of his teeth, “This is where we bring what we haven’t eaten. For your pleasure, McClains, they will tear one another to pieces.”

And they did. Two would come to the front and fight. Fight until one killed the other, the horrible sound of bones being repeatedly smashed against rocks ringing in Lances head for days, maybe weeks after.  
The victor, a hulking bit of prey would let out a roar before throwing the loser into the water. The Galrans tore at the body, in plain sight of all the prey and ate. Lance’s mother, strong and steady, encouraged her children to have some.

“It would be an insult not to” she whispered, voice shaking and gore soaking into her hair, “Just eat something small, make sure they see, then you don’t have to continue.”

So he did. He threw it up almost immediately after they were away from the Galrans, the image of water painted purple against his blue lights etched into his mind

~

Keith got up at this point and left, slamming the door shut behind him and causing Lance to nearly jump out of his scales. Hunk and Pidge just watched him go, each looking… Lance couldn’t quite put a finger on it, they looked sad, but more than that they looked… mournful. He slapped his tail against the water, almost guilty for his story.

They were all silent for a time

“… Your Shiro, can he fight?”

They didn’t answer.

~

Water never ran red forever, it was too pure, too cleansing to be muddied up with death for too long. 

But when they arrived in Galra territory, Lance could smell the death in the air as clear as any light.

He yelled and screamed, smacking his tail against the floor and flooding water out of his tank, and after what felt like far too long Keith was the one that entered.

“What is it?” He didn’t look angry. Not quite, but he did look upset, tired to his bones and Lance had a pang of sympathy for him

“We’re in Galra territory. If you don’t turn back soon, they’ll notice your boat and they’ll sink it.”

“That’s the plan.”

Lance nearly scrambled right out of the tank then, smashing his tail against the side of it hard enough for the glass to crack, “Are you crazy! They’ll kill you, make you kill each other! This is a terrible plan, you’ll all die right along with your Shiro”

Keith lunged forward, and for a moment he thought the prey was going to hurt him, instead he heard the dull thump of flesh on the floor, and saw the boy on the strange split tail joints, hands on the side of the tank, eyes wild, saying far to quietly, “He is not dead. They’ll take us to him to fight, and we’ll escape.”

“Escape! Look, you don’t know the Galra like I do. They’ll tear you all the shreds! And how do you intend to get to safety without a boat? Do Pidge and Hunk even know about your crazy suicide mission?” The translator made some horrid noises with Lance’s yelling, cracking and making broken static between the two of them. Keith was quiet for a moment, which gave Lance all the time he needed to continue ranting

“You didn’t think about that did you? You didn’t consider that they would die before you could get to your Shiro? Are you trying to lose everything? Lose everyone you have?” He flicked his tail out of the water, splashing Keith, “Wake up! This isn’t the only option you have!”

He spluttered and sat back, dirty old water soaking into his hair, “Well? Do you have a better idea?”

Wondering just how he got so invested in the success of these… humans, he straightened up, “Yes, actually. I do”

~

The longer he spent on the ship the more the faces he saw make sense to him. He’d seen Keith on multiple occasions, but as it was he rarely saw Keith without someone else present. There was one point before they could understand each other he knew about, but moreover whenever the boy was around he was upset. He was distrustful and frankly just mean. 

Lance couldn’t even pretend he didn’t give as much as he got when it came to him. But he would be damned if he didn’t try to play the innocent party.

He learned much later on that the humans had a name for them that was laughably incorrect just like the Siren’s had “prey” for them. Not just Keith, but Hunk and Pidge had called him “mermaid”

Pidge had told him stories and myths that couldn’t possibly be true. Stories of love between humans and mermaids, of big ships in the middle of oceans that had seen them, mythology of them even having their own island. He’d told them it was ridiculous, though apparently Keith had taken to calling him mermaid just to see him get upset about it.

He found his own array of nicknames to get back at him with, starting something of a contest on who could offend the other more.

He was almost alarmed to find out that he enjoyed bickering with Keith more than he hated the names

~

He was… curious thinking about it later. At what point the humans began to trust him? There was something special about the look on Keith’s face after listening to the entirety of his plan. He knew it was the best they had, he knew they needed him to be able to pull it off. Without a single complaint, which frankly, was almost worrying, Keith had gone off to collect the others and go over the plan. 

He was shocked how easy it was. They would have to set him free for it to work, and he was as aware as they had to be that the moment they dumped him back in the water he could take off and leave them to their fate, that he was the one who knew the territories, the weak spots, the waters and that without him they were all surely doomed.

Keith out of all of them, should have been the last one to accept that, but he was the first. He should have been the one that Lance would argue with, explaining the ins and outs of his plan and of his own integrity to, but he didn’t. 

He felt… something. Some sort of fondness for the strange human who wanted nothing more than to hate and distrust him. Every time he let the thoughts worm their way into his head he had to shove them away. Keith only cared about getting his friend back and he would go to any lengths to do it. Even trusting a pathetic songless siren who’d done nothing but argue with him.

In the end this was all for Shiro, and Lance had to remind himself of that over and over again so he wouldn’t forget it. He couldn’t get attached to a human who would turn tail and bolt when he had what he wanted. He couldn’t get attached to a human at all.

He had until nightfall for his plan to begin. He had that much time to enjoy the humans he’d spent so much time with before they left him for good.

He supposed he could handle that in the end.


End file.
